Martinsburg independent. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1875-1900, 1887-08-13
THE UNsoLvED LABOR PROBLEM.

many and very bitter experiences to
the majority of the organized labor
element of the country. The plans
adopted to elevate the great army
of bread-winners have been tried
and the result has been one long
line of disasters. The plans have
not worked Somebody has blum
dered fearfully. Since the first of
January, 1887, organized labor, by
the organized strike system, has lost
to labor upwards of forty millions of
dollars that it has not earned nor
received.
These are appalling figures, and
call for the best thought of those
who think correctly. Every result
is attributable to somebody and this
loss to the land of industry is at
tributed to a few causes that mark a
disregard of eternal principles.
Let us see why these strikes and
these failures have occurred, directly
in the labor world.
The labor element Of country
runs no higher than it's educational
line. No matter how high you
raise the walls and pinnacles of
temple it always settles back to its
foundations. So with all these move
ments. And it is this settling back
that jars, cracks, hurts, disturbs,
tears apart and invites ruin. or
those who within the past six years
started in as guides, orators and
leaders of labor, not one-third OF
them have known how to win sue
cess for themselves, have ever sue
ceeded in projecting or ripening a
plan to properly advance themselves,
in q knowledge of cause and effects.
They have been accepted as teach
ers, when all they have taught has
been how to fall.
The bar-room, the saloon the re-
sort of those who meet to drink,
smoke, dull or excite their Brain
who begin by finding fault with 9th
ers and by declaring war, hate,
strike, boycotts, etc., against capital
and well-won rights and accumula-
tions of ideas, capital, credit and
property, are their own worst ene-
mics and the cause Of very much of
the idleness, suffering, poverty and
black-clouded despair that is so
rapidly settling upon all who have
moved back into the darkness rath-
err than ahead into the light.
In all the labor strikes of the past
two years labor has been the great
est sufferer. Labor has no meat,
potatoes, flour and furniture ahead.
Capital can employ labor, and can
always educate others to do the
work which another person has quit.
Capital is education and it's re.
suits. 1t is the aggregated fruit Of
labor, education, economy and
brain power of which all men are
most positively not possessed in the
same degree.
Of the great army of men, not
one out of five is able to create or to
find employment for other than him
self. Not one man in ten can create
employment for ten other persons.
Not one in a thousand has creative
brain power sufficient to plan and
carry on employment for one thous-
and persons. And yet ninety out
of hundred when got to work and
directed soon believe that they can
do better than their employer. One
man out of the ninety may be edu-
Gated TO life that will make him
a favorite of the higher powers, be
inspired to do even better than the
employer, but the balance fall the
moment they force themselves into
a condition for which nature did not
intend and education did not fit
them.
America is not yet prepared for
dictators. The dictator who steps
into the road with a double DARRELL
ed shotgun or repeating rifle and
compels a wagon-load of persons
who were thinking of something
else to hold up their hands and be
robbed. succeeds for a time. but
every survivor and all their friends
are soon on his track. He is watch
ed, headed off, hunted down, and he
and his occupation go out together.
So with this demand that man
whose brain, life, heart, hope, future,
ambition and capital are all invest
ed, as they have been for years, in
a business that has taken more of
money, time, thought, botheration
and perplexity to establish than peo-
pie know of, shall be denied the right
to select such help as he wants to
pay such prices as he and they may
pleasantly and willingly agree upon,
and IN hava llnadncatad hull hao1 Cd